Strange Luminescence
by Grey-Orc
Summary: What if the ability to create something, rather than leading to pride and folly, once led to good? What if it allowed light to enter the twisted souls of some few orcs that their mocking maker hadn't intended? What then, when the war of the ring is over and one has a chance to do her own will for a change?
1. Prologue: Choose your own home for once

**Strange Luminescence:**

 **Garlakh's History**

 **By Grey-Orc**

With many thanks to Sevilodorf for the beta

A Note about Burping Troll Adventures

Like many Tolkien fans, we wanted to move to Middle-Earth. Like many others we created a Role-Playing Group to do so. The Inn of the Burping Troll opened February of 2002 on the Netscape LOTR Message Board and was soon populated by an exotic assortment of elves, men, hobbits and orcs, along with a bartending balrog and a lyrical warg. As the months passed, the personae we adopted took on their own lives. The characters brought in friends and relatives, and a mysterious stranger arrived to turn the place on its ear.

The second phase of The Burping Troll began with the creation of to archive the adventures the characters insisted we tell. New, more canonical, guidelines were established concerning our use of Tolkien's landscapes; however the warg, the balrog and the rehabilitated orcs refused to leave. Thus, our stories are set in the Fourth Age of a Middle-Earth where orcs play cribbage with elves, a balrog serves Rangers steaming cups of mulled wine and hobbit lasses scold the warg for tracking mud on the common room floor.

As all things do, the writers of The Burping Troll have changed over time. Some set aside their pens and keyboards to devote themselves to family and profession. Others ventured on to other worlds and genres. But the Inn remained, though at times a bit dusty and neglected. Now a new writer has happened upon the doorstep to offer up a tale of Middle-Earth. So sweep out the hearth, pull up a chair and enjoy another visit to Northern Ithilien.

(Garlakh's History spans from before The Hobbit until after Adamant, adventure 18 in the Burping Troll chronology, though it is not necessary to have read those stories to understand this one.)

Prologue

November 1423 S.R.

Ephel Duath

I look around in satisfaction at the place I have chosen to make my attempt at a life without Dol Guldur and over that, Lugburz. A deep sheltered cleft in the mighty wall comprising the western border of the land once called Mordor conceals the entrance to my dwelling, hiding it behind rock that narrows almost to the point of coming together. Unless one is very well acquainted with these mountains, it will most likely be missed, but even if they do know, I will hear before they arrive and be ready if they are hostile. Enemies would be able to approach only singly, for there are no other useable entrances. I studied every inch of this cave and blocked up the other entrance. Only a scrawny rabbit could fit through it now, but at its widest it, too, would have only allowed passage to one at a time. It can be cleared, but I'll hear anyone who tries that way, too. You won't move a boulder that size from the other side without some kind of report.

Stone columns rise from the floor and ceiling, coming together in a few places to form natural divisions. I am not much of a miner or stone shaper, so clearing them is beyond me even if I wanted to. I find I like the shapes they make and would not remove them even if I could. A stream of fast-flowing, crystal clear water flows through the rear of the cave, and I make regular use of it. In addition to the need to have water nearby for work and drink, I have recently learned that I actually like being clean and living without filth if possible.

It's been a long, hard, rewarding few weeks of work. One of the cave's small fissures that keeps the air fresh is positioned just right to act as a chimney of sorts, so I built myself a makeshift smithy. It's very crude and won't last long as it is, but I'll eventually have enough metal to construct something more permanent. I also have built rough tanning facilities, and I look with pride at a few hides that I've already started preparing.

Everything I own is near tatters by now, and I must make myself new armor and clothes to wear ere the winter bites hard. There's only so many times and so much damage even the best smith or hideworker can fix, and I've about hit the limit on all of this. I also must lay in foodstuff. I'm used to living in mountains that meet forest, so I can handle this. I just might make it here if orc-hunting Tarks and the more violent orcs will leave me be, but I'm done for the day in any event. I've gone with little sleep lately, driving myself as hard as any of my warlords ever did.

I walk past several naturally-formed ledges in the narrow middle portion of the cave where I will put my finished works until I can work up the courage to test the veracity of the rumors that there are some few Tarks who will deal with orcs. There's nothing on them yet. I've only just finished the forge and will have to head to that swamp I saw on my way. Looked like it ought to do nicely for bog-iron. I'll have to be careful, though. Someone's got a farm there and I'm not looking for trouble with the locals. My fingers itch for the feel of hammer and tongs and my eyes long to watch the metal go from black, to red, to white, then sparks fly from it, the metal yielding to me as I hammer it into shape - the protesting hiss as I dunk it in the quenching barrel - another thing I'll have to build… Ah, I can't wait.

I miss the iron of the grey mountains where I was born with an almost physical ache as I gaze at the bare stone shelves and consider the bother of grebbing all that ore. It takes so much bog-iron ore to make a refined ingot. The less pure versions are workable and make iron sufficient for tools and the like, but long experience in Mirkwood tells me the purer the iron, the harder it bites, and the better it protects against what's trying to bite you. That's another day's worry, though. Tomorrow it's more hunting.

The work and storage is done a few yards downstream from the living division of the cave at the other end. There's not much in this part. I don't even have a pallet these days - something else to build. My cloak, a once supple thing of shadowy-black warg fur, is now grime-stiffened and tattered. Nonetheless it serves as my blanket and pillow both as I curl up within its folds, pull the hood up and tie the cloak shut against the oncoming fall night's chill. I do at least have a firepit for cooking, and I have a low-burning fire in it at night. At least the overhang that disguises the entrance to the cave keeps out the wind and likely will do the same for most of the snow, so the cold shouldn't be as bad as it might otherwise be. As the sound of the flowing water lulls me toward sleep, it occurs to me I will be very glad for having my forge close by in a few months; even its residual heat will likely keep me warm enough. This already feels like as close to a home as I've had since the end of the war, but my mind drifts back even further to when I was a youngling and I had my first flirtation with iron. As I fall asleep I remember it, then walk a path of dreams made of my own memories and thoughts, some of which I kept hidden even from myself…


	2. Forging a smith

Unknown Day 1283 S.R.

"Garlakh!"

The call booms through the cacophonous clang of metal on stone, the swishcrack of whips on the backs of sluggish and unwilling snagae and their squeals of pain and fear. I drop the newly empty ore sack and wipe sweat from my brow only to see the mine boss waving me over to him as someone fills it again, though I don't see who at first. I approach. What else are you going to do when your boss calls, even if it feels like the 917th load today and your muscles seem to have all the strength of pond scum?

"Ya, boss?"

He points at the sack I'd just dropped, now freshly filled with iron ore and tied shut, the ropes made into handles. Nagluk's work, no doubt. Never seen anyone take such care with a knot other than him. Then he points to an even larger one that causes my arm, back and shoulders to groan in protest even without lifting it. He doesn't know or care, of course, and I know my place and don't mention it.

"Your shift's about up, ya? Take those two up to forge seven and call it a day. Don't be late tomorrow either."

"Ya, boss," I repeat, doing my best to keep the resignation out of my voice and off my face. It's easier than easy for him to miss it. My voice is always soft and nearly lost among this din. He watches me just long enough for me to acknowledge the order with word and nod, then his attention's gone again as he calls for one of the other ore carriers even as I stagger off with the two sacks, which are indeed as heavy as they looked.

My immature muscles strain and scream in protest I try to ignore. Forge seven is all the way at the other end of our territory. I'll get no dinner until I'm done and I take a risk stopping at a well just outside the mines for a good dousing with the bucket followed by drinking one. I take as long as I think I can safely get away with, but the sooner I deliver this load, the sooner no one will have a claim on me for a few precious hours. I shoot The Shaven Dwarf a longing look as I pass it, the coppery tang of bloodswill flowing out its door along with raucous drunken singing about the adventures of a raider in a Tark's village. Swill will have to wait, too. I pass several workshops where they carve up bone, wood and stone for weapon handles and the like. The forges are scattered around various mine entrances and it's rare for me to have to take a load this far. Strike that, it's never happened. I don't find out why it did today, either.

When I reach forge seven, I find myself thoroughly surprised even through my exhaustion. I've never taken the time to watch the smiths too closely. Usually the ones next to my usual mine want me to just drop the ore and go, but today, this one tells me to sit on the stool and allows me to rest, so I watch him. He's not my boss, but I'm used to following orders. He unties the knots closing both sacks and examines the ore, grunting in satisfaction. Then he takes a few chunks of it and puts it in the forge. The smell of melting rock and metal is acrid, but I find myself engrossed as I watch the smelting process. I don't notice that he's watching me watch the metal and noting my fascination until he speaks to me when the slag is cleared away and the ingot is cooling in its mold.

"Out with you, I'm done for the day," he says gruffly, though that's positively polite by the standards of our kind. I jump to my feet as if scalded and he laughs, a deep, hearty laugh that fills the room when I stumble and have to catch myself against the anvil. Though my mind forgot I was tired, my body did not and reminded me in no uncertain terms as my legs nearly gave out under me.

1283-mid 1301 S.R.

I skipped the swill that day in exhaustion and many more days after that in fascination. All the other smiths shooed me away when they caught me trying to watch, but never the one in forge seven. He worked nearly alone in the smallest forge, unlike the others that worked in cavernous rooms. He was accompanied only by a small, bulky goblin that tended the bellows. The smith told me to call him Dorishak. He hesitated before he gave me that, making me wonder if it was his real name. I decided it probably wasn't. Who would name their offspring glove? Sword, axe or bloodletter maybe, but glove? Dorishak he was ever to me, and if it was a false name as I suspect I didn't find out why he used it for several years. It turned out he was on bad terms with the chief and if not for his skill, would have been dead before I was born. For hours, days, months I watched him turn ore into ingots and ingots into suits of stout-looking mail, shields and helms. It was crude work as I later learned, but rarely did I see better equipped orcs until I started doing it myself.

For a couple of years I watched him, until one day his forge tender drank a few too many in the Dwarf, got into an ill-advised fight with one of the underbosses and lost an arm. I was, for only the second time, officially ordered to go to forge seven with a huge load of ore, and told not to come back to the mines for work the next day as my assignment was changing. Only then did I learn that Dorishak and the mine-boss were on uncommonly good terms for orcs, actually twin brothers, though blood ties are seldom publicly acknowledged in orcish society. Dorishak thought I might have a calling for his work and, ore carriers being rather easier to come by than truly skilled smiths, the mine boss reassigned me so I could be retaught.

The work was difficult but rewarding. Some days I spent with him learning to tend the forge and then to work the metal. Others I spent learning how to tan and work skins. Then, once I was competent with both, he taught me how to actually make protective gear. That was when I got my tribal scarring, when I officially took up the trade that would shape the rest of my life. A red hammer was branded and then colored on my cheek, and I've worn it proudly ever since.

Dorishak gave me a good deal of advice that has stood me in good stead in the years since, but the essential piece was "be the best at something the chief needs and you're set, even if you're captured". It was years before I learned just how crucial that was to living.

1301 S.R.

Grey Mountains

"Garl," Dorishak calls impatiently, "Go see what's keeping Nagluk.! Lazy snaga's four hours late with my ore!"

Dorishak has been in a black mood all day. He's been pacing and fretting, constantly looking outside as if expecting someone or something other than Nagluk, and I thought he was going to lash me when I overboiled that piece of cuir bouilli he had me try making. He's been working on perfecting the design for several weeks now and at the point where he's ready to pass it on to his understudy. A whip hangs on the wall, though I've seen him use it perhaps twice in the 15 or so years I've been working with him, both times on someone who was deliberately, blatantly disrespectful because of his bad blood with the warlord. I thought today was going to make number three, but he resisted the temptation.

I'm having a little trouble with temperature control. That's a drastic understatement similar to saying that if you chop my arm off, I'll bleed a little. My most recent failed effort sits beside me, a monument to that fact, looking like nothing so much as a shriveled half of malformed and undersized melon. It was supposed to be a helm. It might fit a rabbit, but not an uruk or even a goblin. I lay aside the piece I was cutting in preparation for another attempt and rise from my seat at the workbench. I'm in a bad mood, too, unusually for me. I'm normally pretty even-tempered, but if he snaps at me just once more … I don't know what his problem is today, but I'm happy to go for a walk lest I say something I'll regret.

No, that's not true, I do know what his problem is. I know exactly what his problem is. My failure with the cuir bouilli would usually be worth no more than a sigh, a few tips, perhaps a corrective clout on the shoulder if the mistake was one he found especially dumb and an order to try again. His problem is this spreading war going on between the warlord and his second. There's an ominous tension in the air as I cross the complex to the mines where I spent my first few years working. Everyone I pass looks at me hard as if expecting me to attack. I don't, but the same can't be said for many others in the tribe. It's been like this for a while, but today it has a sharper feel.

Am I the only one who thinks the lieutenant is an utter fool? The quick way to do this would have been to challenge the warlord personally and directly for his post, then fight it out publicly in a one-on-one combat, winner to take control of the tribe, loser to be beyond caring. That isn't what happened, though. He chose to involve the entire tribe in his bid for power. No one can feel safe. Anyone even suspected of sympathizing with either side is at risk of having his throat slit, a knife in his back, or an arrow in his eye. The warlord adopted similar tactics trying to get rid of any of those who wanted to usurp him, so it has become an untenable situation where the warlord's loyalists will do it to anyone thought to be supporting the usurper, and the usurper's lads will do it to any warlord loyalist they find. It can't go on like this. I'm a little surprised one of our neighbors hasn't come and taken us out while we're at each other's throats.

I've long since stopped going to the Dwarf for a drink after a day at work, going instead straight to bed. Sleeping lightly is the way to keep alive. There is no private space, all of us lined up in smelly, filthy pallets, but no one can say I support anyone if all I do is my job. Only Dorishak knows I still stand with the Warlord, but I don't know where he stands. I'm not dead yet, at least, so I guess that's something.

"Hey, mine-boss, have you seen Nagluk lately? He's got ore due for number seven and he's hours late," I keep my words terse when I reach the mines and find the mine-boss in the middle of directing the cleanup of a small cave-in. He's got no time for chatter, and he's never a chatterer anyway. We have that much in common.

"Probably slackin' off at the Dwarf again," he answers gruffly, indifferent to his missing ore lugger, and immediately returns to the more urgent problem at hand. I know Nagluk, though. That's not his style. He's as willing as any to have a drink or six after a long day, but not while he's got orders to be somewhere else. He used to be a slacker, but he got tired of being lashed for tardiness by the weaponsmith in number one or the mine-boss himself and shaped up. If the mine-boss weren't so distracted with his own problems, he'd probably remember that, but I don't ask again. I look around the cavernous area. No Nagluk anywhere. Just to prove my belief right or wrong, I go to the Dwarf. It's full of slacking and off-duty ore luggers, bone carvers, stone carvers, skinworkers, and warriors, but no Nagluk.

I leave the tavern and slide into a quiet side tunnel for a think. A fragment of a conversation comes to mind, Nagluk confessing to me he'd started taking the long way through side tunnels in hopes of avoiding the war. Suddenly it's like someone poured snow from the top of the mountain straight into my gut. I think this very tunnel would actually be on his route. Perhaps if I follow these to the forges again…

Halfway back I find him in a pool of his own guts and blood with a dagger bearing the usurper's symbol buried in him. The ore is still here in blood-stained sacks where it landed or was thrown against the wall in the fight, so I pick it up and continue. Dead orcs are as common as gravel these days, and who would I report it to anyway?

I don't make it back to the forge. Soon after the last side tunnel pours back into the broader main passages, There is a wide intersection that sometimes doubles as a meeting hall when the various smiths meet to haggle over ore allotments, talk designs or whatever else. It's always noisy and bustling, but today there is a pitched battle there. All of the smiths in the area have come out trying to defend their forges and it seems nearly impossible to tell who's who in the melee. Not all of us wear signs of allegiance to one or the other. It'd be dangerous to do so; it's something only the biggest and boldest do. I can't get around the fight, so I let the sacks slide to the floor. I guess there's no choice but to take a public stand now. I find someone wearing the warlord's insignia and fall in with him, and there I also have final confirmation that Dorishak and I are in agreement, even with the bad blood between him and the warlord. He's right next to me. I give him a toothy grin and draw my daggers, using them to gesture to the ore when he spots me. He nods, but there's no time for news or conversation and we wade into the fight. I see that ore again weeks later and in another place, though I don't recognize it as such because one piece looks much the same as another.

1301 to mid 1306 S.R.

Grey Mountains

It was my first major battle. The fight was utterly barbaric and brutal. The usurper's troops ended up winning that battle, but the warlord won the fight that mattered when he killed the usurper. Nonetheless he was assassinated that very night when he took the wrong sow to his nest, leaving a leaderless few alive. I was among them, but Dorishak had tried his luck against one of the best spearmen on the usurper's side and found himself not up to the task. There really was no longer a functional warband. Orcs wandered the tunnels alone or in small groups, some with a purpose and others not. I wandered the tunnels alone, aimless and with some nameless hollowness inside for weeks living off rats, bats, and cave lizards. There was no longer anything for me in forge seven, or for that matter anywhere in the tunnels of the Red Hammer.

As it happened, I reunited with some of the remnants of the Hammer in my next tribe, called the Silver Spears. There'd been a fragile peace between us and them during my lifetime. They knew about the fallout of the civil war. Some of the Hammer had gone to them willingly and others were captured. Four of their scouts finally caught me getting a drink of water and gave me an ultimatum to forge or die. There really was no choice. I don't know why, but I have always clung tenaciously to life and done what I had to to keep it. I agreed to forge. They needed me, so reluctant or not I was safe. None of those they'd captured from the Hammer were smiths and they had lost theirs to some odd creature that they said lived down a well. They tattooed their sign over my tribal scar to mark me as theirs, but didn't manage to get rid of it completely.

Their territory was smaller and not quite as rich with iron, so the miners ended up using the Hammer's old mines and they cannibalized our old place for anything else they needed. It had copper, but that's no good for armor. I did get to play with it a little when the brewer needed his still fixed. That took a day and no more. They brought a few specialized tools they hadn't had from forge seven and I got to more serious work. I kept Dorishak's design in mind, but didn't work on it yet. This chief had no time for experimentation.

Mid 1306 to late 1311 S.R.

Grey Mountains

My new chief was more ambitious than wise. He had rigid separations between his crafters and his warriors. He always had me making armor for way, way more uruks than he could possibly outfit. Maybe he thought it would impress the big tribe in Gundabad or make him look bigger to someone else. I barely left the forge even to train with the longknives and daggers I preferred for weapons. It ended up saving my life, as I was kept back in the forge when most of the warriors went out to raid some nearby Tarks with the warlord. It ended very badly indeed as I learned during a spar with my brother Garnog, who taught me how to use knives in the first place. Many of the warriors did not survive the raid, and the warlord's hide was used to decorate the gate to the tarks' village.

There was a time of debate in the significantly smaller tribe as the new chief and his underbosses decided what to do. Some wanted to perhaps tunnel deeper into the mountain for protection and to get space to increase their numbers by conscription, conquest and breeding with any female they could find. Some suggested there was no need to dig and the Hammer's old tunnels would do. However, the new chief made the incomprehensible decision to go across the plains. We all paid for his attempt to move the tribe. We ran into slavers from Dol Guldur and those of us not killed in the skirmish were captured and scattered in various sales throughout Mirkwood forest.


	3. Master your trade and your mind

Early 1312 S.R.

Mirkwood Mountains

"Move it, you maggots!"

The slave driver's demand is punctuated by another crack of the whip across my back. His whip is a thing of tightly knotted and twisted leather with what feels like a mixture of jagged stones, glass and metal shards twisted into the leather. I know very well the feel of it, for it feels like the thousandth time it's cracked across my back. I've given no trouble to him - why would I? I have nowhere to go back to, I've become used to changing warlords and this is just another way of doing it.

"Faster, maggots!" Heedless of the fact that we're all at our limits for lack of food and water over the last days, he cracks the whip again, this time across my legs. I've had more strokes on my legs than on my back. Probably the only reason I'm still on my feet is stubbornness. I silently contemplate ways to kill this oversized pile of festering pushdug one day and settle on a specially juicy one that involves a sizeable fire, a roasting spit and a bunch of screaming. I'm just a nice easy target. Many of the orcs left are shorter than I, sometimes half my size or even a quarter. I've never seen runts like this in my life. One of the smallest orcs drops and, though the driver lashes with tongue and whip both, he doesn't try even once to get up again, lying utterly still beneath one of the odd spires of rock that dot these mountains. His eyes have that glazed look I've seen often enough lately - if he's even still breathing, he won't be for long, and he's never going to do the driver's bidding again. Soon enough the driver realizes this, too, and leaves him to rot.

We carry on down into a tunnel that has a bitter musky smell of caked filth, blood and bodily waste. It's a familiar smell, for it's what happens when orcs live together. Nobody cleans ourselves or our surroundings, of course. It's not a thought that occurs to most of us. Perhaps our skins would come off if we tried, so caked on is the filth.

I let my mind wander down that path and other paths strange to any orc in the brief respite the driver gives us from that whip. There's no turning or escaping here and he knows it; the tunnel's straight as an arrow and too narrow for more than two to walk abreast. It might have been smooth once, but it's crumbling now, abandoned perhaps by whoever made it. It's not orc work, that is quite plain to be seen by the runes all along the stone at about shoulder height to me. They go unnoticed by the rest of the smaller orcs, being well above their heads, and by the driver, who's too busy watching to see if anyone else falters. I think sourly to myself that he probably doesn't have the brains to note the runes and wonder about who made them or what they might mean. Dwarf work's my guess.

I'm suddenly jarred back to more orcish thoughts as we're brought to a halt in the center of a bare room ringed by torches. This is apparently where the local warband buys its slaves. There's a man-high orc waiting for us. He's the tallest one I've ever seen, his skin a dark umber color, one eye a copper color and the other just gone, an indescribable bubbling mass of tissue where it should be.

I'm positioned at the far end of the line of slaves as we're all set into place for his inspection. He scoffs at the size of the others and I can definitely see why if he looks like the rest of the band. He's quite right of course. The rest of the Hammer and Spears were either sent off with other slavers or already sold along the way and what's left is a sorry sample of orc kind, half dead and knee high to him. No doubt fearing he's going to earn himself a whipping from his own master if he doesn't sell at least one of us, the driver finally points me out to the big orc.

"Here," he says, and though he gives the other orc no title or name, probably not knowing either, his tone is positively servile. "This one might suit you better."

I'm in pretty sorry physical shape at the moment from the whippings and lack of food and water and my clothes are torn to shreds, but the driver grabs my arms and twists them so the big orc can see my forearms and hands, clearly marked with the signs of a smithing trade. I again contemplate ways to kill him as he uses far more force than necessary, wrenching my shoulders and causing me to stifle an annoyed growl. The spit occurs to me again even though I don't eat orc flesh, but I let the urge pass and focus my attention outward. The big orc's copper eye immediately catches on the scars of my trade and he easily recognizes their origin.

"Hreh, this is more like," he says, his voice hoarse and raspy. "What kind of smith is she?" My breasts make it obvious I am indeed a she, though I've never made an issue of them.

"I don't know," says the slave driver in a display of utter incompetence, his voice suddenly small and timid. Only then do I realize he never asked me any questions as he drove me here, nor any of the others. I'd been too busy taking lashings from him to think of it. The copper eye looks to me then waiting for an answer. I gather it's not customary for a potential buyer to speak to a slave, but in this case there's no choice.

"Well, snaga?" he barks.

"Armor mostly," I answer, my voice softer even than usual with my exhaustion. It's quiet in the room, though, and he hears me just fine. His expression changes, the lone working eye lighting with interest that it's perhaps fortunate for his chief's purse the driver doesn't see. It's the last time I'll ever have the word "snaga" directed at me except when I scare him.

"Hrah!" I later learn this is an exclamation of triumph or pleasure for him. He goes off with the driver and they settle on a price for me. I don't ask what he paid. It doesn't matter. All that matters is it seems I'll have yet another warlord and the driver's going to have to find another target for his cursed lash.

I'm soon separated from the other runts and the driver's off again. I'm left with the orc, who turns out to be from Gundabad.

"We needed an armorer bad," he confesses. Then he shows me his leathers, which aren't in much better shape than my clothing. "Our armor sow ain't been seen in months and no one else can fix it. You ain't gonna desert or get yerself killed , are yah? What's your name anyway?"

"Garlakh. No I'm not going anywhere. Got nowhere to go even if I wanted to, and no I don't plan to die." My answer is terse. This is a uruk who has some authority if he's buying slaves and he's got no time for chatter beyond the necessities now.

"Hreh, see it stays that way. Don't do anything stupid. No goin' out alone. Now listen up, we're organized into three crews: scrappers, stalkers and makers. Scrappers are the frontline fighters, stalkers or skulks are the scouts, and the makers …" And he continues to give me the brief run-down on who's who and how things are done.

He takes me down into the main cave where the band lives and gives those present orders to the effect that if any of them let me die to something other than my own stupidity, there'll be Mordor's own price to pay. So it begins. I spend days just fixing everyone's tattered leathers and busted shields, learning better who's who and how the band is organized until it's less of a blur than the brief orientation I was given on my way from the slave holding area. I was given an armband with the tribe's symbol and never took it off as long as my membership lasted.

1312-late 1314 S.R.

Less than two months into my time with this band it changed warlords. The one I met, whom I took to thinking of as Copper-eye, wasn't the chief or even the chief's second, but he was an officer as I suspected. I saw the chief from a distance once, but never spoke to him. He was in the end a very old fellow who lost a grudge match at an orcish moot where all the local tribes were supposed to get together to discuss things. The one-on-one duel was only the beginning. As the chief fell, our shaman revealed himself to have been playing host to some odd fiend. It consumed him, then the dying chief in a disgusting display that made me lose all my meals for the last decade, then formed itself into a monster of earth and attacked the rest of us. Most of the tribes had cleared off before the dual and the one that was left just watched as we took down the fiend. Then they attacked us with the help of a troll. I never forgave that chief even though he was following orders from his own overlord and relished it when he died some years later. Come to think of it, I never forgave the overlord either although for a time he became our warlord, but I'll get back to that.

I learned two things in that fight, where I had expected to die and did not. First, whatever faults I have I am not a coward. One of the scrappers, front line warriors, needed help. Knowing it would probably mean the end of me, I did it. I don't know why except perhaps for tribal loyalty to this new band I'd made my own. Self-sacrifice is not terribly orcish, yet I jumped between him and a troll. That orc never forgot, and afterword there was ever a bond of respect between us for as long as he lived. The second thing I learned as the troll smashed my ribs with a single blow of his massive fist and sent me into unconsciousness is that trolls are strong. I developed a hatred of the things and to this day I take relish in killing them.

The end of that battle was basically that we lost our warlord and his second, moving Copper-eye up to second in command while others took the warlord post. I say others because it was a time of rapid change.

I also learned that this warband in the person of Copper-eye was going to demand more than I knew I had, and I would thoroughly enjoy rising to each challenge. I was constantly expected to pick up new skills and better those I had. Copper-eye earned my loyalty that way, by giving me respect for the skill I had while demanding more from me. Even before the moot this process had begun with a shortbow lesson. This fledgling loyalty was soon to be tested, as the one who attacked us at the moot soon enough came calling demanding we bow to him as warlord. We would have done so had he taken it right after beating the old chief, but for reasons I never understood, he tried to wipe us out instead, then come calling when we were good and pissed at him.

One remained who had been loyal to the old chief for years. He had been acting as our warlord for the last month after his friend's death and he stepped up to challenge. It wasn't even close, and I was professionally offended at the state of his armor, which he had never had me mend. It fell off him in mid fight, and that was the end of him. I was furious with the fool for not making a better show of it - last thing I wanted to do was serve the one who attacked us when he could have just made us his as would have been his right when he defeated our old chief.

No one else challenged him. We had no one to match his fine steel sword, his armor (fine mail like I'd never seen and a full helm in the shape of a skull), or at the time his skill. Our new warlord marked us with the fallen one's blood and we were his, though Copper-eye was left in place as our immediate superior.

Though some had tried to curry favor by going over to his side even before the challenge from the old chief's friend, I wasn't one of them. I waited with Copper-eye and it was Copper-eye who held my personal loyalty, the warlords generally being a non-factor in day-to-day life to this point of my time with the tribe. I took a great chance when I expressed my misgivings to Copper-eye a few days after we were given to our new warlord. His words were a comfort.

"This is my mountain. I'm his lieutenant, for now. Ultimately, Garl, you still answer to me." And that was enough to stop me from contemplating desertion for the first time in my life, for I had come to trust Copper-eye even in a culture where distrust is the norm. Time would show it was also true.

I carried a distaste for the warlord until the day he died and was not sorry when our next enemy slit his throat as he slept. Meanwhile I continued to improve and expand my skills and soon enough was making the best armor I'd made in my life. Plain leather at first, then segmented leather, then mail to match or better any Tark from our nearby enemies in a lumber village along the river and towering far over what most orcs get to wear.

Thus it continued, picking up and improving skills one after the other, and in time Copper-eye truly became my warlord. Not only was I having to work on my skills, I was expected to pass my knowledge of leathers, metal and armorsmithing on to others. I really do hate remembering just how much time I wasted teaching uruks who were there only because the warlord wanted them there and cared not a bit for the work. They either didn't practice what I taught them or died before they could make good use of it. Very soon many in the band were pressing me to challenge the weaponsmith for the position of forge-boss because of the way he was failing to lead and pretty much never around. I declined, though, feeling myself unfit until I could match him in the forge in his area of expertise. He was an unstable sort, volatile, flat out insane at times, and I wanted no part of challenging him until I believed I could take him both in the forge and in a fight if I had to. I was already his better at armoring and metalworking, but knew nothing of weapon making. I'd already been working on picking up weapon and woodcraft, and though it took me a time to succeed at getting a grasp of either, my reliability in my own area insured I was seen as forge-boss even if it wasn't technically true and I refused to accept the title even when I was doing the bulk of the work in practice. Even the warlord saw it that way and finally started actively encouraging me to work toward taking the forge-boss position from under the less reliable fellow. In time I managed, to the warlord's visible relief.

As I watched the various leaders in the band, it occurred to me that I gave respect to some out of obligation to a higher-ranked officer while others got respect from me for their skills. It seemed there were different kinds of strength. Those who were given respect out of obligation led only by intimidation and fear or just because they were the only one around qualified for a certain position. Those I respected most deeply knew what they knew, were our best at it, weren't reluctant to show others, and would include others outside their group when possible in whatever they were doing. They could threaten punishments and deliver them as well as anyone, but rarely had to because they seemingly had less trouble with their people. The warlord himself was one of these latter, increasing my opinion of him still further.

Some in the tribe worshiped a spirit they swore was the spirit of the forge, who governed the crafting of things and relished blood and death. I didn't have anything else to follow, never having been a spiritual being and also being rather disenchanted of spirits after that scene at the moot. I followed that spirit because of my trade, but never asked for a favor. It was just as well, for there was one who did trust him and was abandoned.

There was always something other than my craft to do, too, be it training to learn a new weapon, sparring with fellows, facing some enemy, or even fending off orcs that wanted a roll in bed. One of the other orders Copper-eye gave on my first day was that I was not to be bothered for rutting. As one of the few sows in the band, that would otherwise have been a real possibility. Some asked anyway, but usually took "I wasn't brought here to rut just any passing snaga who asks" as answer enough or didn't live long enough to attain the stature of one of the orcs I would have put myself under. In time one of the skulks took both a long-lasting interest and a patient tack. He was an easy-going fellow who also happened to be a hard worker, one of the band's fiercest fighters and a good scout. He was one of those who'd made it plain he wanted to rut with me, but I made him wait. I still remember how he made a song of my name - "Gaaaaaaarrl" - only one other did so and I hadn't seen him since the slavers took us.

He shocked me in the forge one day a good couple years later after we'd both made marks in the band and become trusted, catching me alone and taking a break. He backed me against the wall and waited to see if I'd resist. There was a level of trust between us and he wasn't harsh about it, so amused, I let him. Then he pressed his lips to mine. Is there a word for that? It gave me a hot rush of some fluttery feeling inside, so I did it back to him, then we both started experimenting with it. He told me I was his mate, and I didn't feel any urge to object. Sometimes he would do something else I have no name for and wrap his arms around me and pull me close to him, too, and that was different altogether: a warm, quiet, calming feeling like I've never known since. At first we would go to a cave behind a waterfall when I could get time away, and eventually we made our situation more public, wrapping arms and touching lips in front of the other uruks, who were visibly disgusted by the displays. Others would brag of how much pain they would bring their partner when they rutted, or the pain they wanted to bring, but he seemed to want to do something different. We didn't get to rut because we both wanted some privacy and time undisturbed that we couldn't get in the warren. We talked about some day starting our own place once the Tarks were defeated, where I could get and play with any metal I wanted… It didn't last more than a few months. I learned one day that as fierce a fighter as my mate was, some elf killed him one day just outside the human town nearby. Again I felt that nameless hollowness inside, but too many others were counting on me this time and I still had a warlord to whom I had given my loyalty. I never told a soul just how much I missed my mate's presence, how much I longed for him to wrap his arms around me and pull me against him again. I have long missed that feeling and longed for it in vain. I can't ask someone to do it. Who among orc kind would understand? I still don't understand over a century later and I feel the longing. He had also for a brief time been the avatar of the spirit of fire and blood, who abandoned him. I could take no vengeance on a spirit. I vowed vengeance on the elf.

November 1314 S.R.

Mirkwood

We wait silently in the darkness in the spot the old warg left us promising to bring the tarks to the ambush. I struggle to remain awake and alert, for as usual I did forge work until only hours before. I'm tired. I'm also used to it. I'm fed and watered, so at least there isn't that distraction atop the exhaustion, but staying awake while you're completely still in quiet and dark surroundings is extremely difficult.

We wait longer. The boss gives us his plan in barely more than a whisper. We're to gang up on each Tark and swarm him. There are several tarks coming that are very juicy because It'll be damaging to the little Tark town if they die. We wait, and we wait. Are they coming? Have they discovered the trap? They believe the old warg is their friend. How gullible are they? The elf is coming, too. We all want that elf. He's the main target. I hope I get just one taste of his blood in my mate's name… Here, elfy elfy elfy…

Suddenly there's torchlight to the east and I hear pieces of a conversation; here they come finally after hours of waiting. Five of them. We outnumber them. I see the elf. First live one I've ever seen. Like a Tark and yet not a Tark. What's the difference? I look between him and the tarks and there's some difference between them, something beyond the physical differences in hair, eyes or ears. Only over a century later will I understand that some deep, well-hidden part of my soul thrilled to that indefinable otherness. Doesn't matter now. I give a silent howl of savage triumph at the look of him. My mate's killer. My artistic side is fascinated with his armor and his weapons. How are they made? Why do they smell like the forest or is that from the elf? That doesn't matter now, either. I want your blood, elf.

I get the blood I wanted, and then some. The honor of watching the life fade from that one's eyes was not mine, but my weapons did touch him. I did get his blood on me and tasted it. I also got his fine white knife and marked it so even if I lose it, it'll never be the thing of beauty it was to an elf. I also killed a tark or two. We head home in exultation, each of us carrying as much loot as we can and still move - for only one tark escaped us in the end. The others are all dead and add their weapons and armor to our stores.

*~*~*1315 S.R.-1419 S.R.

There were plenty more battles in the century or so between the elf's death and the downfall of the lidless eye. I could spend a good while telling you of battles down deeper in the mountain with more of those little runt goblins like I saw when I was sold into the tribe, spiders ranging from tiny to troll-sized, very real trolls, some of which could shift their shapes to look like tarks, battles with other orc tribes in the mirk, battles with the elves of the wood, more raids on and around the folk of the nearest tark town or the larger tark town out on the lake a ways away, or even battles with the dwarves when the dragon was slain and driven from his roost in the Lonely Mountain. We were the tip of Dol Guldur's spear and made it hard on all who opposed its might.

We had our share of wins and when the losses did come they were devastating. By the end of the battle in what they call Dale, the only ones left from my very first day in the tribe were me and Copper-eye. I never challenged him or tried to become his second, though. I always left that to the fighters to thrash out among themselves. It was always good enough for me that the boss knew where to go for smithing and knew I was loyal to him. He did know it very well. He once described me as "the one least likely in this warband to try and gut me", and you have to be an orc to understand just how much trust that is.

My focus changed from armor to weapons and back again, depending on the tribe's needs. If there was an armorer who lived long enough to get good under me, I'd do weapons. If there was a good weaponsmith, I'd do armor. That could change many times even in a single year, for turnover was always high between the deaths and new slaves and volunteers being brought in. All the tribe's members knew that as long as I was given respect, I was quiet and even-tempered unless you didn't take care of your gear. Hand me a piece you didn't seem to have even tried to maintain yourself and I would give you a tongue lashing. The warlord saw me at it once and said I was well within my rights to do it even if the orc would usually outrank me, as I was the one who had to keep the gear up.

I was often called on to torment or brand our enemies when the bosses wanted to use heat and fire to encourage talking or mark a prisoner. I could do it, but I was rather businesslike about it. I was as quick as I could be with it especially when it was a branding. I didn't have the overwhelming need to cause extra pain for the sake of it, which I never understood, but also never mentioned. Still more than a few died under my hands. Then I would return to the forge and take double the pleasure in whatever I was working on.

I never again found a mate. My mate would not have approved of that; he told me at least twice that if something happened to him I should move on quickly, but it didn't happen. If the warlord had asked, I would have been his. There were others who could have asked, usually among the strongest or those I got along with best, but none did except in what I took to be jest. I never had even a casual roll in a nest with someone because it would have put me out of work and there was always too much demand for what I do.


	4. Lose all you know, find yourself

March 1419 S.R.

Mirkwood Mountains

Howling silence surrounds me. These caverns are suddenly much too large for the one orc left alive in them. Copper-eye is dead. I found him myself in the battle near the elf king's palace, his skull-shaped helm having failed utterly against some great blow, blood and gore trailing all down the rest of him and seeping still from several wounds. Then the clouds that had covered the world for days parted and I was stricken with the urge to flee, not only from the light of day, but from the elves and from I know not what all else. So were the rest of the orcs, both those surviving from my band and the others. We scattered through the forest, and of most I cannot tell. Only of the few surviving in my band can I speak, for they are what I saw. I stand in their blood now, all of us managing somehow to get back into the caves where we have lived, but the rest attacked each other after that and though I don't remember how, I was drawn into the fight, too. I stand now ankle deep in the gore of my fellows, the only one still standing at all. What is this? What am I to do?

Howling silence is within me. There is no driving will I can feel now - no overriding hatred, No desire to take vengeance on the elves or the dwarves or the tarks, no desire to find another orc band or to be anywhere or do anything else at all. There is no one for me to teach, no one for me to lead, no one to lead me, no one to aid or kill, nothing to do. What do I do? There is only ringing, hollow, shrieking silence that goes to the very core of me - a magnified version of the hollowness I have felt before because there isn't anything to distract me - hollow silence and the most intense feeling of loss I have ever felt. Yes, loss is what this is. I have lost all. I have no one and the things and knowledge I have are all worthless without someone. I sink onto a pallet and, though I don't know what it is I feel or what's happening to me, salty-tasting water leaks from my eyes and I suddenly can't breathe; muscles that have always been steady even in great exertion and brought air to me are suddenly too tight, heaving, delivering their air only in irregular spasms and even then not enough of it because my chest has a mountain on it, and my nose is all clogged and I can't seem to stop making these odd sounds. Breathing is physically painful, even more painful than the time that troll smashed up my ribs - but the pain's not all physical, is it, Garl?. It's even more frightening than the emptiness. This never happened no matter what bone was broken in battle or training. What is this? Stop it! But I can't stop it for what seems like hours or perhaps days.

The next thing I know, my eyes feel like I've been rubbing dirt in them and it takes a great effort to pry them open - when did they shut, anyway? It's fortunate the caverns are empty and I have all the keys because if anyone walks in on me right now, I'm a sitting duck. Then again, why is it fortunate? Why not just do the deed myself? It's not like anyone remains to miss me. No one needs what I do anymore. Maybe I'll even see my mate again -nah, no chance. I've never believed there's an afterlife for orcs, and if there is it's probably just eternity of what we've already been doing. I don't want to do that anymore, I realize faintly.

I draw my dagger and look at it. It's my best ever weaponwork, masterfully made with a braid of golden hair from a tark wrapped around the hilt for decoration. The light of the golden hair is incongruous in this darkness lit only feebly by torches. Yes, why not do the deed myself. I sit, mesmerized, staring at the dagger with its golden hair wrapped around the hilt and its blade much notched and chipped from the recent battle. One of the notches looks like someone took a bite of it. I've always kept my gear in good shape, but I haven't had the chance to mend it yet. Why not just stick it in right here -? The dagger's point touches a hole in my hauberk. If I drive it in at just the right angle...

 _NO!_

The word's so clear it might have been spoken, a shout of defiance and almost pleading from somewhere, but the voice isn't familiar at all. I look around. Am I perhaps not so alone as I thought? No, there's no one alive here. Naralog's dead eyes stare at me from where someone killed him as he slept off another drunk. That explains why he wasn't in the battle. Lazy snaga got killed in the end anyway. Then what was it I heard so plainly?

 _NO! NOT THIS WAY!_

The voice comes again and I realize it's inside me. I wipe the water from my eyes and turn my thoughts inward, listening.

*Why not, if not like this?* I ask the voice.

The answer isn't words at first. Instead I see pictures and feel feelings. The elf's eyes, alive, intent, a somehow brilliant forest green and somehow different than a Tark's eyes. The feel of my mate's arms around me when we had a moment alone together, that warm, calm quiet that I just wanted to stay in - the hot fire that burned when our lips met -. the faint, never-expressed feeling that I preferred the greener, lighter parts of the forest to the blackened ones that were better for the purposes of my overl-former overlords. The passionate contentment I felt when it was just me and an iron ingot, doing not only what the boss wanted but what I wanted as well. The feeling that filled me when the boss would praise my work or give me some sign that he valued me. The pride I felt during those times I was head and shoulders the best smith in these parts bar the long-beards, and no one in any of the tark towns around could match me. The warm feel of the respect everyone in the band gave me - not from fear, but because I helped keep them alive and in better stuff than most in these parts could get they knew it. The voice comes softer now as it has my attention.

 _Think about it. If you do this, you'll never know. You'll never understand why you engraved the elf's face so accurately on that knife. It wasn't just part of your vengeance. You were asking a question and now you have the chance to know the question and the answer if there's one. You'll never know what you felt when your mate held you close. Do the tarks have a spirit they worship that is their god of forging without the death and destruction, or perhaps the elves do? You know you were never satisfied with the spirit you worshipped deep down, though you gave lip service when you had to give it. Blood, death and destruction don't bother you and you can dish them out as well as anyone , but the forge was always where you found your most intense pleasure. You'll never know why you like the parts of the forest and the mountains that are undarkened by The Shadow - you do and you know it, or why the shadow in this forest made your skin crawl when darkness is easier on you than full daylight. It's OK to admit it now. You'll never know what it's like to have no will but your own guiding you. You want to know why you were never the thief that many orcs are, and why you didn't want anything you hadn't earned, and why you never seriously considered betraying a chief or anyone else even though betrayal is a way of life for orcs, and why you took such pride and joy in your work and contemplated ways to make things shiny or with more smoothness and beauty than is usual for an orc. You can admit that too now. You want to know why you respected more freely for skill rather than the ability to cause fear and why you preferred to receive that kind of respect yourself although eventually you could challenge anybody in the band with your weapons, too. You want to understand a lot, don't you? Yes, it's a frightening thought, but isn't it worth the trying at least for a little while?_

I touch the lock of chestnut hair around my neck. I had to give up using the elf-knife about a year ago, its edge finally ground too far down to resharpen properly, so I took off the lock of hair and braided it differently, then used the elf's teeth to form a clasp and one to dangle in front. That tooth has become something I rub when I'm thinking about something. The elf's remains are no longer a symbol of vengeance, I realize now, but what they are I don't know. I think I wear them as much out of habit as desire.

The voice is right, of course. Whatever this feeling is that makes me wish I had followed the boss and the rest of the tribe into whatever waits is nearly crippling, and so's the hollowness brought on by this feeling of loss, but I refuse to yield any longer. For whatever reason, I'm still alive and somehow have a wit or two about me still. I touch the tattoo I got the last time there was a skilled drawer around other than myself; on the side of my neck and usually covered by my armor, it's the tribe's marking. Then I let my hand drop. I mend my gear and gather some tools, , food, a couple good-sized empty skins I'll fill from the far fresher river outside, soap, torches and all my money (quite a bit from running a shop for a century) from the suddenly enormous cavern, the only sound being the sulfurous bubbling from the drinking pool as I do so.

It can't have been more than a day or two in this still chilly weather of late winter. . The bodies aren't stinking any worse than the rest of the place yet. The soap I usually use in dyeing leathers, but maybe it's time to take another lesson from my mate. These caverns have an all-pervasive smell about them that seeps into anything left on the ground, anything you wear, into your very skin, but if I'm going to get by the elves and tarks, I need to lose it as soon as I get out of here. He's the only orc I ever knew who bathed; he said it kept him hidden from all. I guess I'd best try it too, then.

I go through the whole cavern system, even into the boss's room since I found his key lying next to him in the ruins of his pack along with his money. I guess he'd rather I have it than one of the flower-bloods, so I brought it with me. I take what I think I might need or want, even a wide-brimmed hat once looted somewhere, for something tells me I'll be going places where there'll be no respite from the yellowface. There's still no sense of guilt for looting the dead, I note dully. No one's here to miss what I take, so I take all I can carry, even the keys though I'll never use them again.

Lastly I take a torc I made long ago, the only thing I ever forged and decorated entirely to my own taste. It's covered in depictions of smithing and mining and the tools used therein, with no hint of the tribal symbol or any other orcish trademark. Copper-eye always said it looked more like something a dwarf would wear. I lock the boss's quarters, the officers' quarters, the door to the main hall and then the gates to the cavern behind me. Let the lads lie there undisturbed by anything but maggots for a while.


	5. Master yourself, own your soul

Early 1420 S.R.

Somewhere east and south of Mirkwood

I leave puzzles all over behind me as I make my way slowly east and south. The elves know there was an orc lingering around the palace for a while, I think. Many times I had to dodge their trackers as I watched their skinworkers from a distance and learned a new method of tanning that will suit well for travel or when I settle elsewhere, if I live that long. It must have puzzled them that I never attacked even when I could have caught one alone. There were times when my tracks and an elf's path overlapped, but I always left them alone.

I left several months later, taking a mistakenly abandoned and very nice pair of freshly-made walking boots and leaving a gold coin behind. I never paid attention before, but my coins are of different metals and have all sorts of different markings on them. The metal I understand. Gold is worth more than silver, which is worth more than copper. The markings I do not. None looked elflike to me, so I hope I paid a decent amount to whoever made the boots. That would have been another puzzle for them, and months later still I smile to myself at the memory as I come upon someone's small farm in the middle of nowhere.

Mirkwood forest is far behind me now. I linger, watching the old tark man do something to the dirt. There is, for a brief moment, the urge to kill the weakling, then it's gone again. I still must struggle with my breeding, instinct and training, but it's easier now.

I watch from under the brim of my hat. My helm is tucked into my pack for the moment. The old tark's got both legs, but he's badly lame. He'd be an easy kill - _no_ … It is a struggle for him as he bends over some tool with which he's moving the dirt. It's not a hoe, shovel or scythe. I made all three at least once and sold them to other tribes or traders. We didn't farm. What's this tool, then? Suddenly it catches on a rock. Is he alone here? Is there no one more fit to this task? I watch him bend to remove the rock, tossing it onto a pile of others with casual strength. Naught wrong with his arms, then. I watch him struggle until dusk, then he steps out from behind the thing and goes into what I take to be his dwelling after drawing water from a well just outside the dwelling. The safer thing would be to leave, but I find some inexplicable, unfamiliar urge stirring in me and that isn't what I do.

I wait until dark falls and step across the wall behind which I've been lying and watching. I walk through the field and see his task is only about a third done. No sound comes from anywhere in the area. He has no animals with him? I have passed other farms where some four-legged creature vaguely like a wolf set up an almighty racket when I got close although I never stopped. I do some more of the work for him while the whiteface is up and after it sets. My tracks are undoubtedly all over his field, but he'll have a far easier time of it tomorrow when he comes out to discover there's only a narrow strip left for him to do. Let that be a pretty puzzle for him.

An hour before the yellowface shows, I leave his farm and make my way to a stand of trees such as occasionally appear on this generally open, flat land. I eat a little of the last meat I smoked, take a swig from a waterskin and tuck myself into the shadow of the largest tree to sleep, wrapping my cloak around me.

It seems no sooner have I dozed off than I'm roused by uneven footsteps on the other side of the copse. They stop. I'm caught. There's no way for me to get out without him knowing it. I should have just left when I had the chance… Hands on my weapons in case the tark attacks, I wait. Suddenly I hear a scrape of metal on dirt, then a clunk and slight slosh. Then the footsteps retreat. What? Speaking of pretty puzzles…

I wait until I can just barely hear the sounds of field clearing again before I move to where his steps stopped. It seems he shared his breakfast as I find a battered metal pot with a mixture of sausage, eggs and some grainy stuff I've never seen before, and a small bottle of something white. I scoop up the meat and grain with my hands. It's unexpectedly delicious or perhaps I'm just hungry. Any way it's soon gone. I dredge the pot with my fingers until I can't get to even a single piece more. The white stuff in the bottle is another indescribable treat, cool and thick. It leaves something on my lips when I've drained the bottle and I lick it off. It occurs to me if he has no livestock he must have paid someone for this. He doesn't seem to have much. I would like to clean his dishes. It somehow seems the thing to do, but there's no readily available water source I dare try to reach, so from behind the tree I wait until the old man's back's turned, leave his pot and bottle on the wall along with a few copper coins and leave before he changes his mind or decides to call whoever lives nearby. Who would believe him if he tells them an orc cleared a large part of his field and didn't attack him when it could have? He must know, though, because although I'm not wearing the boots people usually associate with orc track telltales and my tracks are smaller than a grown tark's, no youngling could do the work I did.

August 1421

Sparsely populated plains

I have continued to wander east and southward slowly and so far aimlessly and seen no one and nothing for several days. I've killed several bands of highwaymen, even caught one in the act of trying to rob some tark, but that was several days ago and I didn't stick around to talk after clearing his way. It never would have occurred to me before the end of the war that I'd be glad for a sight of trees, but the thought occurs to me now as I drink the last of the water in my skins. Careful as I've been with it, it wasn't careful enough. Trees often enough mean water and I need some badly now. I'm almost out of food, too, so I need a deer or a boar so I have enough to smoke and last a while.

I don't get it today. I shoot several rabbits and eat them raw, tucking their skins into my nearly empty pack for later tanning. I have come to prefer my food cooked, but today I hope for extra nourishment from the blood that's usually lost during the cooking process. I should have known better, though. As tasty as bloodswill might be, it doesn't do well at satisfying a thirst. Neither does this. If anything it makes me even more thirsty as I now must deal with a sticky mouth. As I suck dry the last bit of marrow from the last rabbit, I contemplate my course to this point. Why have I gone east and south? Mordor was there, but so what? At first it was to avoid the elves no doubt swarming around Dol Guldur and indeed all over Mirkwood - or what is it they call it now? I don't know. I heard they renamed it, but I never caught what they call it now. I stayed too far away to hear them clearly. If I could hear them, they could hear me if I sighed or shifted my feet under me. I also needed to get into a less populated area. If I don't want to fight, I'd best not be seen by those who'd kill me, and I'd best stay away from any temptation to fall back on my breeding. Yet now I find myself lonely for any company at all and if even if it takes a threatened fight for my life to see another face, I'd deal with it.

I contemplate the question some more as the sun sets. There's no whiteface tonight, only hundreds, thousands, millions of pinpricks of light high above and seeming to go on endlessly until sky and ground meet at some far point beyond the edge of my sight. I lie on my back, wrapped in my cloak, watching these dancing sparkles of light. Then they begin to show in streaks. Some of them seem so close, as if I could reach up and touch them. I almost dig into my pack for one of the oddities I brought from the mountain. I have a sudden urge to paint this scene. Why? I keep watching and finally draw my attention back to the original question

Why am I going this way now? I ask myself the question again as I continue to watch the streaking lights. I started seeing a smudge to the southeast an hour or so back before I stopped and a greener one to the south and west. Every time the wind blew from that way the rank smell of a marsh was brought to me. Water there, yes, but drinkable? Both are yet too far to identify for sure, but are plainly big. The one southeast draws me more strongly for some reason. I guess because I have nowhere else to go, in addition to the other reasons, I think to myself. May as well find out what it is, why I feel drawn to it.

There's a sudden high-pitched shrieking, then a boom as something strikes the earth, the light of its passing so bright that I must slit my eyes against it. I listen to the silence after the boom - a silence so profound that only when they are silent do I notice I have been listening to chirping insects all night without paying them any mind: crickets I think they're called. I rarely if ever heard them in Mirkwood. The silence there was always impenetrable. Gradually they begin to chirp again. Nothing else happens except that the lights gradually cease to streak. Yet I notice there are still millions of pinpricks high above and I watch them until I fall asleep. I haven't had a rest in days and I need a few hours' sleep whether I want it or not.

My dreams are strange. Flashbacks of my best forge work are mixed with memories of the streaking lights. Not even the rising of the yellowface disturbs me for several hours. I have a vague memory of rolling over and burying my head in the grass. Finally though a call of nature forces me from my sleep and I rise to relieve it, putting on my wide-brimmed hat and pulling up my hood against the light despite the heat this leaves me to suffer. A sound infringes on my vague thoughts as I look off toward the smudge on the horizon, a rhythmic, rising and falling sound something like screams. It's in the direction I have to go anyway, so I check it out.

It's a stiflingly hot day and the yellowface beats down mercilessly. It takes longer than I thought it might. Apparently many things carry across plains, sound not the least of them. The smudge on the horizon has come no closer. When I reach the sound I see a crater in the ground with strange colors in it. It's still radiating heat. This must be where the boom came from last night. The colors catch my interest, but there is no time to study them now. The sound does indeed turn out to be screaming. There is a small, thin, weak-looking creature on the ground curled up around itself. I don't understand what I'm seeing at first. I see the creature is bleeding from one of its tiny shoeless feet, red droplets on the ground leading away from the crater until it seems to have fallen again. The creature flails in its agony now and I note something about one of its hands; it's blistering. That's not so strange to me. A smith knows burns. And then I realize the creature looks like a miniature tark. I think I understand now.

The tiny tark must have come to look at the crater after hearing that sound last night, too, cut itself on something sharp, fallen and hit the still sizzling sand. What should I do? Should I do anything? Surely the tark has a sire or - what's the word for the female? Dam? They can't be far. This tark's sending up a racket that can probably be heard for a mile. But no, I look around and see no one coming, no one close by, and there is nothing to distract from the flatness of the plain except for that enticing smudge on the southeastern horizon. What am I supposed to do?

The easiest thing to do would be to just kill the tarklet, my instinct says. Easiest and safest. I could even make it quick with my mace, then be gone and there'd be none the wiser until far too late. That voice I only started hearing after the end of the war is talking again, though, telling me I can't do that, telling me I shouldn't, telling me it's what I'd have done during the war and I don't have to do things just as I would have.

*I'm supposed to risk my life for this tarklet? It's all I've got left.*

 _Yes. You are the only one who can now. Just get the tarklet back to its people and keep your face hidden._

*Why?*

 _Because it's the opposite of what you would have done three years ago._

Good point, strange voice. Perhaps the softness of my voice will help now. It is not so harsh as many orcish voices, so I approach the tarklet, kneel behind it and croon wordlessly as I reach for a bandage in my pack and press it against the wounded foot. The Tarklet didn't see me coming in its distraction and shrieks again at the touch, but I remain still after tying the bandage off and continue to croon. Perhaps out of sheer exhaustion the screams become moans then fall almost silent. As carefully as I can I wrap the blistered hand, too, causing a brief uptick in the pained noises, but the tarklet's strength to fight is nil next to mine and I manage to restrain its struggling without being too forceful. I need water. I know almost nothing of healing, but even I know that these wounds must be washed if they aren't to fester. The tarklet is looking at me now, though between the hood and the hat it can't see my face.

"Where is water?" I use my softest voice, no more than a whisper.

The tarklet points back to the southwest. "I can't walk," it says, its voice a trembling whisper. "It hurts so. I want my mommy. I'm not s'posed to be out here."

Then I see water leaking from its eyes as it moans again, making sounds I remember from my last days in the mountain where I lived so many years, if somewhat softer. Others do this?

I take off one of my mail gauntlets and brush the water away, my calloused and scarred flesh catching on what I realize is very supple, soft skin on the tarklet. I lick the water off my finger once, but it's salty just like the water my eyes once leaked and doesn't help my thirst at all. Moved by some impulse I don't understand, I keep brushing the water off as it leaves the tarklet's eyes even though it's of no use to me, using the softest, lightest, most delicate touch I can manage. Finally the water ceases to flow and the tark falls completely silent, its breath slowing as it relaxes somewhat. I wonder if it is still conscious as I lean over it. Yes, it is, its grey eyes half open though somehow looking drowsy.

"Your mommy?" I ask, wondering silently what a mommy is. Again it points southwest. Find water and mommy at the same time, it seems to suggest.

"I'm going to pick you up and take you to your mommy," I say quietly, hesitating over the unfamiliar word. A nod is the only answer, so I put the gauntlet back on and lift the little tark as if it were something fragile, laying the blistering hand on its chest, getting both my arms underneath its body and letting it rest its weight against my chest. One of my hands holds the injured arm still and I try not to jostle the tiny thing as I move, taking care that my stride lurches less than usual. I feel something against my left breast and look down to realize the tarklet has pressed its face into my cloak. It wrinkles its nose and lifts it out again, then inexplicably puts it back where it was. Perhaps my mate's thoughts on bathing had something to them indeed. I haven't been able to do it since I hit this stretch of plains. Must do it again as soon as I find water. I notice dimly that the tarklet has gone limp in my arms and is snoring slightly, causing the warg fur of my cloak to flutter.

Soon enough, though definitely more than a mile away I see a small cluster of wooden dwellings without so much as a log wall around them. I scoff inwardly and think briefly that this would be an easy village to raid, then remember I don't have to do that anymore.

"Is this the place?" The question is of course directed to the tarklet in my arms. The face comes off my cloak and the tarklet blinks. It had indeed fallen asleep as I carried it. It looks around after blinking awake and nods. I carry it into the village and am about to turn toward the well when I hear another voice, this one first relieved and then frantic with worry.

"Garion! Oh, Gary, my son!" The tarklet is suddenly swept from my grasp by a whirlwind of tark woman, her long brown hair flying, coming out of the pins she'd used to restrain it. I dimly see one of the pins fly free and land by a doorway. Before I can react at all, I hear the tarklet - no Garion, I suppose that's a name - acknowledge the woman as "Mommy!"

"What happened to you?" The woman asks. Garion's answer is a torrent of very rapid speech that passes by in a blur, then I realize it's not the common language. The woman looks at me. Before she can ask me anything, I speak.

"I had no water, woman. I wrapped them to stop the bloodflow, but his foot and his hand are injured and must be cleaned before you tend them further." My voice is of necessity louder than it was with the tarklet and she stares at me briefly but suspiciously. Whatever she thinks she recognizes is of little import to her for the moment, lost in the information I imparted. She just tells me where the well is and to bring her some. I watch where she takes Garion and suddenly a metal pot comes clattering across the yard from that same doorway. I take time to have a single dipper of water for myself and bring her the entire pot filled to brimming.

The inside of the dwelling is small. It's no more than a hut, really, with very rough furnishings. The most interesting thing to me is an old but well-tended sword over the mantle with a curious device of seven stars engraved on its hilt. I've never seen the device. The tark woman plainly has some knowledge of healing as she competently begins to clean the wounds, much to Garion's discomfort. I think to retreat before one of the men of the village returns - perhaps the wielder of that sword I was just ogling, but he grabs my hand with his good one and though I'm wearing my gauntlets, he refuses to let go of it. I've never done anything like this, but I let him squeeze and squeeze. The woman doesn't even look at me until she's finished treating the wounds and she freezes in shock. Too late do I realize that I forgot to put the hood of my cloak back up after I had my drink.

I expect her to shriek and run out of the house shrieking, raising whoever else is here to arms. I expect her to get the sword and try to slice me open before I can even get to my own weapons. They're very much in evidence, a mace at my hip in a worn leather harness, two knives in ankle sheaths, a bow and full quiver. She doesn't, though, and the only reason I can think is that I have clearly had many chances to harm both her and her tarklet - son, I think I heard her call him, son, yes, and have not done so - have done quite the opposite in fact. She stares and stares. Garion is staring too now that he can spare the concentration to sate his curiosity about the stranger who rescued him.

"You're an orc," the woman says flatly. It's a statement spoken with as much conviction as if she'd said water's wet. "I thought so when you spoke."

"I thought orcs were mean, mommy?" Garion says.

I have no idea what to say or do. There's no point denying it when it's perfectly plain. "I will leave now and trouble you no more," I offer.

"You'll do no such thing, orc," the woman says stoutly despite the fear I see in her deep-blue eyes. I realize dimly this is the first time I've ever looked at a tark without having to suppress the urge to kill it. Her fear is fading as she looks back into mine, looking very deeply in fact, as if she's looking right into my soul, seeing both what I have done and might be becoming. I let her look. I have nothing to hide. I hope she sees clearer than I do. I'm still confused.

"I owe you at the very least a good meal for what you've done for me and mine," she finally continues after a long minute's silence in which we study one another. "But you'll have to be gone before Adrahil - he's my new husband - gets back in two days. He'll never believe the truth of this. I'd never have believed it if I hadn't just experienced it myself."

"The others -"

"My mother and sister. They won't trouble you if you leave them alone." She cuts me off. They rarely leave their houses."

"What's the other building?"

"A tannery, though none of us have the skill to work it since Danny died last May - Ah, I see that interests you. What's your name, orc?"

"Garlakh."

"Leanne. Now you just sit there."

I yield to this formidable tark woman for reasons I can't explain. Every instinct I have says to run. I'm surprised by the fact that this time, there's no thought of killing the tarks at all before I do the running the instinct urges. I have what might be the best meal of my life. The tark woman had prepared a pot of stew for herself and her son, but she pulls out a ham and bakes it for me as well, though I don't ask her to do it. She also bakes some kind of round flatbread. I gorge myself on some of all of it, bathe as best I can with a pot of water, then go off to sleep in the tannery. The darkness and smell of the hides left there from the last occupant is comforting and it's the best sleep I've had in years.

When I wake a few hours later, I have a proper look around and note that several projects are unfinished, but the tannery is not short on supplies. I sew together someone's sheath - a sheath embossed with that same seven-star device, I note. Then I see pieces for shoes that seem as if they might fit little Garion, some pieces for a couple of larger pairs of boots, pieces of a pack and a belt that looks like it's perfect to hold the sheath. I feel almost whole, the slide of thread through awl, awl through hide, and the feel of the catch as the stitches are completed bonding two pieces of hide together being very comforting and pleasantly distracting. I miss the forge, but this will do for today.

Leanne turns up at what turns out to be mid morning. She brings a late breakfast and catches me working on the small shoes. They are indeed for her Garion, who I learn is something she calls a stepson. Apparently tarks mate for life one male to one female, but when one dies early they might remarry and bring the offspring from a previous mating into the new union. I don't know why she's speaking so openly to me, but since she is I listen all day as she tells me of her life while I finish the rest of the items in between a couple more very delicious meals. Garion will be fine, though he will likely have a scarred hand from his burns.

I finish and go out to hunt, feeling the need to replenish what I used of their supplies before I go with the sun. I have not forgotten her advice to be gone before her husband returns. I bring down a sizeable if unfamiliar animal and return to find a man where I expected Leanne. He's tall and broad-shouldered, with long dark hair and grey eyes much like Garion's. This must be her husband Adrahil back earlier than expected. Where is she? Where's Garion, for that matter? I think I hear two tark's voices, one old and cracking. She and her son must both be with her mother. If so she'll not have had time to talk to her man yet, or perhaps he refused to believe her as she thought he might. Given the man hasn't even put his pack down yet, I suspect the first. It's completely irrelevant, though, as he sees me and immediately draws his battered old sword. I am forced to drop the carcass unbutchered and flee for my life, dodging crossbow bolts once I'm out of sword range.

Suddenly a voice booms out behind me and another smaller one speaks shortly thereafter, "Adrahil, stop!"

"Daddy, no!"

I'm soon beyond crossbow range and thankful he hasn't got a longbow. There are no footsteps behind me. I hope he does listen to them, for it's quite a tale. Poor tark's in for a shock all right.

I make my way back to the crater and pick up some of the strange rocks and bits of glass I find, tucking them into a pouch, then continue on toward that smudge.


	6. Find the forgotten and a purpose, too

Early September 1422 S.R.

Rhun

For some unknown time I wander randomly, not quite straight toward the smudge, passing through lands of men like those we fought beside in the last great war. Once or twice in the early months of it my tribe was called to reinforce a position, and I remember their eyes and their standards. They had no more care for my kind than I did for theirs even then, despite our mutual overlord, and it soon becomes obvious that hasn't changed a jot. With winter coming on in these lands, and with no caves or forests anywhere in sight, I'm at a loss for finding shelter. The idea occurs to me to offer to work through the winter. I remember that tarks can't handle the weather like we can, but none will take me on for even the most menial work, even though both they and I know their numbers were decimated during the course of the wars with the lake-men and dwarves. Most come at me steel first just for asking, and that's when I even get the chance to ask. Usually they just come steel first when they realize what I am. I can't blame them. Nonetheless thrice I am forced to kill, and I continue on until I come to the largest body of water I have ever seen just as the first plants poke their heads above ground. I am mesmorized and forget my surroundings and the danger that is my constant companion for a while. I have seen ripples, yes, but I have never seen water go up and down like this, and the sound of it as it approaches and retreats lulls me into a strange floating sort of daze. I watch for I don't know how long until a movement to the side draws my eye to a boat with at least half a dozen well-armed men coming ashore. There are more behind these men, some with – I dredge my memory for Leanne's lessons on Tark words – women and children, and some with more soldiers. Suddenly the rolling water seems like a trick to me and the daze departs, leaving me feeling briefly restless, a feeling I channel into a head-clearing irritation with myself.

"Fool, Garl, for dropping your guard," I curse myself as I search for some kind of cover and retreat from the shore, turning more southerly now. That smudge is still calling, and I'll die if I linger here. I still haven't found the answers to any of my questions and if for no other reason than that, I continue.

Early August 1423 S.R.

Nameless cave, Ered Lithui

I continued to wander aimlessly for a long time, killing more highwaymen along the way, dodging patrols and people who seemed to be building a road or something and leaving whoever patrols this area a pretty puzzle when they find dead bandits, and only dead bandits, looted and abandoned. I deliberately lost myself in the mountains, aimlessly traveling along for a few days until I found a cave.

This I entered, only to discover it was occupied by some pretty good-sized orcs. It almost became a very nasty situation when one of the largest decided to kill first and ask questions later. He did not live to regret his choice. Still standing in his blood, I watched the others in the cave warily, but let them know by my lack of movement that I would only continue to offer violence if they did.

The moment I step into the cave whose light attracted me, a blur of movement resolves itself into the form of a hulking red-haired orc a few inches taller than me, coming at me blades first. He uses two swords in a style similar to the two-knife method Garnog taught me so many years ago. It seems I startled a sentry and he's in no mood to talk. His attacks are rapid, a blur of movement that is difficult to parry. Rusty iron screeches against rusty iron as I miss the initial parry with my mace and his sword rakes across my gut. He has put yet another slice in my leather tunic that I wore to muffle the mail's clinking and provide an extra layer, but his iron has seen even harder use than mine and the mail links hold. I let my torch drop and draw my dagger, matching him weapon for weapon, though the nature of my primary weapon and my heavier armor make my moves less rapid than his. It's the last hit he lands. My parry is better and his strikes become increasingly wild and desperate. He caught me by surprise and had I been wearing anything less, I'd be dead, but it soon becomes clear he doesn't have my skill. A quick flash of movement draws my attention to several other orcs drawing weapons and racing across the cavern, but they're still too far to do any damage. None of them have bows.

In his desperation he makes a mistake, getting off balance as he takes an especially wild swing. He loses his footing and falls, flopping onto his back with a stream of words in a dialect I don't understand except for the tone, which leads me to believe he's cursing even as he starts to try and gather himself to rise. I certainly would be. Already both my weapons were on a downward stroke and it has too much momentum behind it for me to check it in time; the mace crashes into his head and the knife into his chest. His rusty swords clatter to the floor and he flops limply as all tension leaves his body. His death was mercifully quick for both of us, for I find myself wishing somehow that I hadn't had to take his life and pitying him on his journey to whatever awaits us orcs when our lives are finished. His blood flows out of him as if from a burst waterskin and I'm standing in it looking down at an orc I only then realize is completely unarmored, wearing naught but rags.

I stand unharmed, the inferior and much-dulled iron of his blades unable to penetrate my mail, even battered as it now is. I ran out of oil far too many months ago and can do little now to prevent its rusting away, but it still has some time left to it and still does its duty. There's a long moment's profound stillness as all movement in the cave ceases, the leader having raised a hand I didn't see as I briefly examined my kill. The only sound is the crackling of a low-burning fire in a makeshift firepit. I wait quietly. Are these lads going to make me kill any more of them? Will I have come all this way just to die here like millions of orcs before me and long before I can learn anything or do anything to redeem myself?

Suddenly from the back of the cave comes a voice I had never expected to hear again.

"Gaaaaaaarrrrrl," a croon I hadn't heard since I was very young. The voice was too deep to have been my mates even if I hadn't already known he was dead. I recognized it immediately. I hadn't heard that croon since before he started to teach me to use knives and it used to make me happy for some reason I never understood. I looked deeper into the gloom.

"Gana?" I had been slow to learn speech and that was what I called my brother for the first couple years of life and even after I spoke properly until he began to teach me. Then it was either use of his proper name or his rank, never any closeness to be shown publicly again. Pet name for pet name today, then, brother? Is that your way of telling me there's no threat? My mind briefly flashes back to that croon; he used to hunt for the tribe and it was his task to see the pregnant and nursing sows and their young were fed and he made me and my dam his last stop, always saving us a little something extra.

And sure enough there he is. He steps forward, hands extended, open and empty in token that he does not wish to offer further challenge to me.

"Stand down lads," he says to the four remaining orcs in the cave. "I know this one. No, Gorthak, she ain't for ruttin' tonight." The one called Gorthak looks monumentally disappointed that he must keep himself inside his pants yet again and has had to do so for quite some time to judge by his grumbling. He's a fine specimen of uruk kind, big and strong, but Garnog's right I'm not interested in rutting. We all put our weapons away and I step out of the fallen orc's blood.

"Don't worry about him," Garnog says before I can speak. "Never did have any brains. Only reason he was here is because I saved his hide when the towers fell. I slept lightly around him."

I learn these orcs had been cobbled together from other shattered bands into a new one that served right around the gates of Mordor and this is all that's left, many of the rest having thrown themselves into the pit where Barad-Dur once stood, many more having wandered even deeper into Mordor to whatever's on the other side. Garnog, too, had become something of a leader and as the other orcs went back to their dice and dinner as suited their moods, we sat off to the side talking for hours.

"I stay here because it's easier than the risks I could take," he tells me. "Lost the urge to kill everything I see and I don't have any other skills. You know all I was ever really good for's fighting, hunting and skulking around. He -" pointing to one of the other orcs, but not naming him -"Has taught me a bit of mining. This cave's just about exhausted, though, so we're gonna have to move again. I've got some ideas, but who knows where we'll end up? You, now. You're different, you might be a little more than all right if you can work up your courage if you've learned all that. You always did love making things so I'm not surprised. I've heard tell there are some humans who'll deal with us. You'll be one like they've never seen, Garl, with those skills. They're used to the likes of me and these others. I doubt they've had someone skilled come out. There were forges not far from here, but they were all crushed to powder when the Eye's power broke. None came out of there at all. I can't speak to what happened to the White Hand's uruk-hai, but it can't have been much better for them."

He stands and walks around me, studying me intently. His gaze is envious as he looks at my mail, slightly rusted now from lack of oil and battered by fights with beast, man and orc. "That's good stuff. Wish I'd ended up in your band. I can see the quality of it even as battered as it is now. You haven't been able to do a lot to take care of it lately, have you? Dumb question. You were one of the few who always took care of your stuff. Anyway, you'll be safe here today."

After several hours hard sleep we're talking again. "We're going further east, but if that fails I might seek out some Gondor tarks myself. I've heard rumors there are dwarves within a couple days of here and they'll have no love for us, so we might not get far." he tells me. "The men out east past the dwarves and the nearest tribe aren't anything to talk about. Too much like us orcs. I think your road lies back south and west. There's an inn I heard about where orcs have actually made friends with the tarks. Not something I understand, but maybe I will one day. Luck to you, Garl. I don't know why we've both been spared, but I hope we meet again."

He kneels in the dirt and draws a map to guide me, telling me about a couple of different swampy areas and other landmarks along or near the path he suggests I now take, then taps a sparkling red stone with greenish flecks where he says the inn is before rising. For some reason I can't explain, I'm tempted to wrap my arms around him, pull him close and squeeze, then just hang onto him a while. He seems to hesitate, too, watching my eyes with an oddly soft look as if he is considering something similar. We both fail to bridge the gap between wishes and reality. He gives me a rough swat on the shoulder and we go our separate ways for the time. I remember my encounters in Rhun and have no desire to repeat them, but before I seek out Gondor tarks I need to answer a question. I am still drawn to see what's on the other side of these mountains.


	7. See the Ashes, be Free of the Ashes

Early September 1423 S.R.

Northern Mordor

I thought the people of Rhun had a hard go of it, but now I see what total destruction looks like. I haven't seen a living soul of any sentient race in days, the last being a scrawny, starving orc just after I crossed the Ash Mountains into what was called Mordor. I haven't had it easy myself and have gotten pretty thin over the last months, but apparently I frightened him anyway. He darted into a crack in the rocks and I had no reason to follow. I'd be surprised if he still lives.

Surprise,, though, is too mild a word for what I feel now. I can see the jagged shape of Mount Doom from where I stand. It looks like it came apart from the inside and spewed its substance all over this land in a torment. It's only the second most amazing thing I've seen since the war, though. At my feet is a gaping pit, with the gusting winds lifting ash from around my legs to fall into fathomless depths where light doesn't penetrate. I don't know what's down there at the bottom or if anything is at all. Even if I had a rope I wouldn't try to discover it. In all my days I have never seen such annihilation. We never did it to the tarks or the elves or the dwarves, and try as they might, they couldn't do it to us. This, though, looks like what happens if an angry spirit has its say. I don't want to meet the architect of this destruction. I recall vague garbled rumors saying that our lord had been brought down by a single half-man – no, Halfling, they said, who had nothing but his will, and something about a ring and that mountain over there.

I stare longer, trying to comprehend it all, to make sense of the garbled rumors and match it with what I see around me, keeping myself still and silent and listening to the eery wind blowing bits of ash and rock past me. I don't know how long I stand here listening and reflecting. I suddenly seem to hear whispers in the wind, and just as suddenly feel great feelings of bitterness and disbelieving rage, as if the wind is giving voice to this land or something in it. The sounds and sensations grow until I don't know where I begin and they end. My mind is filled with a cacophony of sound and fury, fragments of memory that flash before my mind too quickly to process along with an overwhelming urge to throw myself into the pit.

A sudden dim question forms in my mind, "Why? I still want to know…"

The feeling grows stronger and stronger, more and more insistant. The partly formed question is lost In the din. It becomes not only a maddening set of emotions and thoughts, it's physically painful as I stand poised on the edge of the pit, lost to my surroundings.

Something shifts around me and the din, while by no means going silent, is pierced by someone's words. It takes me a moment to realize that this is an other fragment of memory, for some reason caught in a mysterious current of this maddening flux and held still for a single crucial moment.

"It's one of the things I'm workin' hard to teach my Garion," says the voice of Leanne as I work on a shoe. "You got to learn to make your own choices. There'll come a day when you must, because no one else is gonna do it for you, and really you shouldn't have others makin' your choices for you. That's the core of what it is to be a thrall, havin' no say in your own life. I'd rather be dead."

The flash of clarity is swept away in the roaring torrent. The cacophony slowly resolves into almost understandable words and I recognize the overwhelming voice of the one whose will has been mine for most of my life. I am suddenly angry on my own behalf, not merely in echo to his rage.

"No! Begone!" I shout, though there's no one to hear me, and for a moment my surroundings come into focus enough for me to realize I'm leaning forward over the fathomless dark pit. I step back. Again the din grows stronger, the emotions more forceful still. Instead of the pit, I now see a tall tark, raven-haired and grey-eyed, seemingly alone in some trees and wearing a set of green and brown leathers any of my band's skulks would have killed for. And speaking of killings, I suddenly seem to hear a command to find and kill this tark. The urge grows and grows, but something feels wrong. As strong as it is, I am not lost in it. Who is this tark that I should kill him? Why should I follow this order?

"No!" I call out to the empty land around me again. Am I going insane? There is a moment's ominous silence as the wind goes briefly still, then there is a seeming redoubling, then a second redoubling of the cacophony. There is a sense of something near desperation to it now in addition to the bitterness and rage, and the sense of disbelief is stronger. I almost lose myself in the torrent of feelings and dimly realize I've dropped to my knees in physical pain that is a dim echo of the roar In my mind. Instead of one lone tark in the woods I see a seven-tierred city with banners fluttering from the highest point, banners with that same odd seven-star emblem I saw on that unfinished sheath and the sword at Leanne's dwelling. The image shifts a bit to show a different tark, older than the first, with a bit of grey in his dark hair, similar grey eyes, and with some big winged thing on his head. I seem to be looking at him from near a window. I don't know this tark either, of course. I've never seen him, but the command now is to put an arrow through his eye or die trying. Yet there is something in that eye that is more powerful even than the urge to kill this unknown tark. Something like a light, but not quite. It is impossible to describe, but I am left with the impression he might know something of the questions I have been trying to answer since the war ended. The pain in my head spikes as the cacophony redoubles yet again. My commander of old is exerting all his remaining strength to make me forget all but him.

"I will not!" The words burst from me in a spasm of coughing. I come to myself to realize the reason for the coughing isn't just pain, I'm lying face-down on a hill of ash, having apparently fallen at some point. I rise again, continuing to hack and clear my throat.

"Do you hear me? I am no longer yours." I mean for it to come out defiant, but it's more a raw whisper than anything else. My throat isn't clear yet. There is an impenetrable silence, probably because the cacophony in my head fades to nothing and I am left listening to the natural movements of the wind, which I now realize is blowing from the west. There is a brief an overwhelming feeling of futility, disbelief, rage and despair that I can't explain but realize is not mine before I'm left to myself. I'm just dead tired, almost literally, and I want to find somewhere safe to lie down. That won't be anywhere near here, for sure. I stagger away from the pit, heedless at first of which direction I'm even moving.

I end up going back into the mountains and dodging Tark patrols. I am mostly driven to get far, far from the pit where once stood Lugburz. I get lucky this time and there's no mounted patrol at the gate when I am, so I slip out of Mordor and wander the mountains of shadow until I find a nice cave that suits me.


	8. Epilogue and endnotes

Epilogue

Early December 1423 S.R.

Wetwang

Well that's the last of it for the moment. I scratch the back of my neck, unable to shake the feeling that I'm being watched yet again.

I stretch my aching back and shoulders. I've got all the iron ore I can carry and I have to get back to the cave now. I wore my lightest, most supple leathers for this so I could carry all the more, and I've spent the last month or so here skulking around and collecting ore. Amid the reek of the marshes I can smell little, but the sky says snow is coming as I look up at it, blacker than black this midnight.

I've spent the last couple of months before this gathering hides and wood and done much of what I needed to do to prepare for winter. Over the winter I am going to start stocking up. I've built the bed and everything else and I've got a goodly supply of hides. First order of business is to replace my bow, weapons and mail, all of which have seen better days. I've already done the cloak, this time a white one of many rabbit furs that will do nicely for winter camouflage. I think I'll also get back to Durishak's cuir bouilli design now. I've got some wax, too, and I think I can improve on it a bit. If I do it right, it'll be almost as hard as metal and still light. I return to the cave just as the yellowface struggles to pierce the thick cloud cover and the first fat flakes swirl down. Sleep, then work. Such has always been my life, though this time it's at least of my own choosing. I do think, though, that I'm going to have to come back when the weather breaks and see who's watching me. They've been following me for three nights.

TBC in the sequel, working title First Contacts, where it will actually intersect with the other AU's published characters and timeline.

Endnotes

1\. The events between 1312-1314 are to a great extent derived from events on the Shadows of Isildur mud at .us, as is the setting for where Garlakh spent a century. I have been deliberately vague with names during that time because the events involve other players' characters, though I tried not to do anything that would portray them incorrectly and to stick to my own character's knowledge and take on things. I give huge kudos to those mentioned and those not for providing a fun bunch of RP. At time of updating, it is TA 2918 on the mud, so it's all AU of an AU, you might say, since I seriously doubt any of our characters will actually be alive in TA 3019 if the mud still even exists at that point, probably not even 2941 during the events of The Hobbit.

2\. Using the meteor shower as a plot device can be blamed on one of Shirebound's stories in her lovely quarantined universe at .com, though at the moment I don't remember which one and she certainly didn't have any stargazing orcs.

3\. Adrahil is no relation to Tolkien's Adrahil. I just thought I'd borrow the name.

4\. A virtual toast is raised to the authors of The Burping Troll universe. Ladies and gentlemen, you can curse or take pride in it, but this is the longest thing I've ever written of my own free will, or probably even if you count the things I had to write for coursework, too. Very well, I'll just give you all credit for the longest thing I've ever written, period and full stop.

5\. If you read the first version of this tale, you'll notice the dates are off. Some events have been moved and expanded on at the request of my lovely beta reader. Thanks for re-reading and I hope you enjoyed it. We're already working on a sequel.

 **Cast of characters:**

Adrahil: Male human of Dunedain lineage and appearance.

Copper-eye: male orc, umber skin and one working copper-colored eye, warlord in Garl's last tribe before the war's ending. Died in one of the last battles of the third age in Mirkwood.

Danny: Male human. Tanner and hideworker, co-settler with Leanne and family, old man who died of natural causes.

Dorishak: bald and Bulky male orc, armorer in the Red Hammer. Generally mild-mannered, but was not on good terms with Garl's first warlord, kept alive only because of his skill. Died in Red Hammer civil war.

Garion: male, human of Dunedain lineage and appearance, son of Adrahil, stepson to Leanne.

Garlakh: female orc with granite-colored skin, scraggly black hair and amber eyes, built asymmetrically with a wiry lower body and a bulky upper from her trades. Is a master of smithing of all kinds and of leatherwork and is at least competent with wood. Seeks redemption and to know the fullness of emotions, being already well acquainted with the negative end.

Garnog: wiry, granite-skinned, amber-eyed male orc with a thick mane of brown hair. Garl's older brother by a few years and by the same parents, which is unusual in what passes for orcish society. Hunted and fought for her first tribe, delivered food to the section where the pregnant and nursing mothers and young children were kept until they were old enough to be shaped into useful war tools. Privately acknowledged and aided his little sister as he could. Currently mining in the Ash mountains.

Leanne: female brown-haired, blue-eyed human, probably of mixed heritage. Has at least some training in healing. Newly wedded to Adrahil. stepmother to Garion.

Nagluk: Male orc. Ore deliverer. Died in Red Hammer civil war.

Naralog: tribe member at end of war of the ring. A lazy drunkard mostly, who missed the final battle in the forest and died where he slept in the cave.


End file.
